Chris Cooper's Blog, page 38

The 2024 Two-Brain Summit: Take Action Today!

I’m blown away by the Two-Brain Summit every year.

The annual event was once a small gathering with a lot of empty seats, but now it’s straining the ballrooms at the Crowne Plaza Chicago O’Hare.

In 2024, we had about 1,000 attendees, and we literally had to change the seating plan to accommodate the crowd.

It’s an amazing feeling to be among the best gym owners in the world—I hope you can experience this in 2025.

Check it out—I’m in this photo, along with 1,000 people who are changing the world one client at a time:

I and my staff feel a lot of pressure as we plan the event every year—not just because it’s challenging to organize a giant conference.

We feel pressure because we want to generate ROI for gym owners.

I want people to have fun and be inspired at the summit, of course. But if you know me, you’ll know I’m less about rah-rah, run-through-the-wall stuff and more about clear, focused action.

I’ve been to lots of conferences where I said “wow!” as an amazing speaker held the room. But if that speaker didn’t prompt me to do something to improve myself and my business, I set my admiration aside to find something actionable from another speaker.

We literally pick our summit speakers every year by asking “what do gym owners need to hear right now?” and then we challenge everyone who goes on stage to give gym owners clear actions they can take to build their businesses.

In the many summit rehearsals before the event, we asked our speakers, “What do you want people to do after they hear you speak?” And they had clear answers.

See, I don’t want the summit to be an expense for the people who attend. I want it to be an investment. I want everyone to leave with tools that will help them generate more revenue, close more sales, build stronger teams and serve clients better.

Build Your Business!

In 2024, I believe we sent 1,000 people home with clear next steps, and that fires me up because I know what happens when the right people take the right actions at the right time. Think rocket ships and fireworks.

I talked to a host of people in Chicago, and they were all fired up and ready to improve their businesses—and they had a to-do list to help them get moving.

I even saw people taking action on the spot as owners connected with the coaches they had brought and said, “What did you learn and how can we improve the gym right away?” (The coaches had clear answers, such as, “Let’s start a 50-plus program next week!”)

If you were at the summit this year, I hope you’re crushing your to-do list and moving your business forward (drop me an email or DM to let me know).

If you weren’t there, we’ll keep telling you how to improve your business all year on all our platforms. Stay tuned and get ready to move!

And, of course, I’d like to invite you and your team to the 2025 summit. We’ve already started planning, and it’s going to be amazing. You’ll hang out with the best gym owners in the world, see the speakers who can help you most and then leave with clear next steps to improve your business.

See you in Chicago in 2025? Hope so!

Get your tickets here.

The post The 2024 Two-Brain Summit: Take Action Today! appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

The Group-Class Unicorn (and Why Chasing It Can Cost You)

I met a unicorn the other day.

Her name is Saara Snellman, and she runs CrossFit Kreis 9 in Zurich Switzerland.

Here’s why she’s so special:

CrossFit Kreis 9 has 340 members.Membership is capped, and the gym has a healthy waiting list.The gym derives most of its revenue from group classes.The gym only loses 10 clients a month.Five of the 10 departing members are replaced by returning clients.The other five are replaced with people on the waiting list.The gym has no marketing costs.

This was the ideal when entrepreneurs started opening functional fitness microgyms in 2007 or so.

But almost none of us accomplished the goal.

And few people can accomplish it today.

Don’t worry: You can still build a very profitable gym without 340 group-class members.

Let’s be clear: CrossFit Kreis 9 is rare.

I wanted to talk to Saara for about three days straight to find out how she did what I and so many others couldn’t. Her gym is a shining example of what a great business owner can accomplish—but I’d stop short of holding it up as a target. It’s just too rare.

To suggest every microgym owner can do what Saara’s done is like showing the 100-m final at the Olympics and suggesting you can run that fast one day.

I’m not saying this to be insulting; I’m saying it so we can have a realistic conversation about your first goals as a gym owner in 2024.

Data doesn’t lie: It shows that gyms like Kreis 9 are few and far between, and after mentoring thousands of gym owners, we know that it takes elite skill to build a gym that serves more than 300 members through group classes.

According to our “2023 State of the Industry Report,” the average gym has about 159 members (PushPress stat) and grosses about $10,000 to $12,000 USD per month (Wodify stat). Only 71.9 percent of gyms in our survey were profitable.

Here’s what Chris Cooper had to say about that:

“The (group) model has flaws. The average group has three to seven clients, not 12. Yet the average gym owner has invested in space and equipment for 12, so six-person groups barely cover the bills.

“Worse, most gyms are undercharging for coaching: They’re selling small-group coaching at large-group prices. That puts gym owners in a real pinch: They’re not making enough with six people in a group because their prices are too low, and they’re paying too much in expenses.”

All this happened to me and many, many others. The situation is very common because—as Chris said—the group-only model contains a few deadly traps.

Coop laid out three ways to keep a group-class gym afloat:

1. Coach every class yourself all day every day. (I did this; it sucks, and I hit burnout.)

2. Pay coaches a low wage and make very little yourself. (I sorta did this: I paid coaches industry-standard wages but never paid myself a dime. This was increasingly hard on my family.)

3. Supplement the model by selling personal training, semi-private training, nutrition coaching and other higher-value services. (We started doing this with a mentor’s help, then completely changed our model to small groups and nutrition only after COVID.)

No. 1 and No. 2 are not viable long term. Only No. 3 will solve the problem.

Here’s the cool part: You can choose No. 3, still run the group classes you love and make about $100,000 a year with 150 clients.

And that’s the data-driven target I’d set for you: Figure out how to make $100,000 with 150 clients.

Build a great gym and hit those numbers. Then decide what to do next.

With a very profitable 150-member gym, you have options. Could you pursue 300 clients? Absolutely. Saara did it. But you might not want to. Acquiring and holding 300 clients is very hard, and it requires a major level-up in your entrepreneurial skills.

You might be able to make more with less work by improving your model and serving fewer high-value clients with hybrid programs (PT plus group classes or nutrition coaching), semi-private training, super-premium life coaching, etc.

The point here: The group-only model is very challenging. It can be downright dangerous at times, especially as large chains with big marketing budgets attempt to fill fitness classes with people who pay very low rates.

Huge, very profitable gyms like CrossFit Kreis 9 are fantastic, but these few businesses exist in spite of the flaws in the group model, not because the model will work for everyone.

I’ll help you research a model that will work for you, your market and your perfect client. If you dig in and work the numbers, you might find that group classes are just the thing, but you might discover better ways to earn a great living through your gym.

To see five gym business models, complete with spreadsheets and analysis, read “Five Ways to Make $100,000 a Year From Your Gym” by Chris Cooper. You can get it by following the instructions here.

The post The Group-Class Unicorn (and Why Chasing It Can Cost You) appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

The Rate Increase: Exactly How Fit One Five Got It Right

Mike Warkentin (00:02):
Raising rates on members can be scary. In fact, it was so terrifying that I almost ran my business into debt before a mentor helped me raise my rates. With assistance, I was able to stabilize my business without losing all my members. The Two-Brain Playbook works, but you don’t have to take my word for it. Today, on “Run a Profitable Gym,” I’ve got a gym owner here who’s going to share the details of his recent rate increase with you. I’m Mike Warkentin. This is “Run a Profitable Gym.” Please hit “subscribe,” so you don’t miss a show. We crank these out twice a week, and we give away the cheat codes for gym ownership, so you don’t make the mistakes that I made, and you find out the best practices from the industry. So please hit “subscribe.” Now direct from Franklin, Tennessee. We have Tim Rainer, who owns Fit One Five. I love that name. Tim, tell me what’s the “one five” come from?

Tim Rainer (00:44):
It’s our area code. It’s 615. And so, we took it, small logo: 615. And big ones: Fit One Five.

Mike Warkentin (00:50):
Nice. It rolls off the tongue. I think it’s such a great name. I am pumped to dig into this with you because I love hearing about gym owners that stabilize their businesses, and it’s such a scary thing that I think we can help some people maybe not be so nervous about fixing their businesses. Are you ready to go?

Tim Rainer (01:05):
Yeah, absolutely.

Mike Warkentin (01:07):
Alright, so you’ve done several increases; I think it’s about four now at this point. Set the stage for me: How was your business doing, and what made you do a rate increase in the first place, like your very first ones?

Tim Rainer (01:17):
Yeah, so we—our gym started out pretty well. We took out no debt, and we paid cash for everything. And we kind of committed ourself to paying just a minimum amount every month. But what we realized was early on we tried to do group classes, like large group classes, because as every gym owner wants to do, when you start the gym, you want to help as many people as you can. And so, what we started to realize was we come from a background of personal training, and we opened a gym to do large group training. And so, we also know nothing about marketing. We know nothing about all of the things that run a business, but we just were really good trainers, and what we realized was we were doing what we thought was good, but we weren’t making what we expected to.

Tim Rainer (02:07):
And that’s tough, right? Because you’re putting in a lot of hours and you’re just trying to make things work. So, we kind of have two buckets, right? We have personal training revenue, and then we had large group classes. And what we were realizing is that every year that we were open, our personal training revenue was going up and our large group classes were staying the same or going down. And so, when we opened, we maybe started at like 75% group training revenue, 25% personal. But then every year, it just started to flip more. And even at this point, it’s probably 75% personal training and 25% small group training. So, the way that we looked at the first couple rate increases was, “Well, our personal training revenue is good, but our group class revenue is bad, so let’s just do a rate increase on this because we need to get this up because right now we’re losing money, paying out coaches, but we make our margins on personal training.”

Tim Rainer (03:07):
And it’s kind of like this cyclical thinking where it’s like, “Well, we don’t want to raise our personal training rates because that’s a lot of money, so let’s just raise the ones that aren’t making money in that aspect.” And it just kept being the same, you know? I mean, you raise 50 people for a group class by $10, and it’s still only $500 a month, and you could sign up a twice a week client and get more than that. So, it’s not—it’s helpful, and you’re grateful for the extra revenue, but it doesn’t fix the issue.

Mike Warkentin (03:37):
OK. I’m sorry. I want to interrupt. You did three increases, correct? And do you remember what the numbers were, what you went from?

Tim Rainer (03:44):
So, we started at 189, and then we went to 199, we went to 209. And so, we just kept bumping up group classes by $10 every year.

Mike Warkentin (03:53):
When you did that, how did it go? How did the members receive that? How did you implement it, and what happened?

Tim Rainer (03:59):
Yeah, I think that that’s something that you learn too, is you basically—you have to have a reason for this. And like our reasoning and the numbers behind it weren’t super sound. So, it’s just kind of like, “Oh, we’re just”—the common thing you hear is, “Well everyone increases their price, so we should too.” And that’s a really bad reason to do it, you know? And they went OK. We never had anyone who totally lost it, and they understand the value behind it, but it just didn’t fundamentally change our business. So, then it’s like, why are we just increasing to increase if it’s not improving our margins? And if it’s like our business is still growing on the training side, but the group class side is not making a dent in our margins as owners.

Mike Warkentin (04:43):
And did you do these three increases like every year for three years? Or how did you space them out?

Tim Rainer (04:49):
Yeah, it was every year.

Mike Warkentin (04:50):
OK. And you said you did them without the help of a mentor, correct?

Tim Rainer (04:53):
Just totally on a whim.

Mike Warkentin (04:55):
Yeah. And was it scary? Like when you thought about the first one, were you just like, “This is terrifying”? Because for me, when I even thought about it, it was terrifying.

Tim Rainer (05:04):
Yeah, the first couple, you really overthink it. You’re like, “Oh man, this is—it’s going to be bad.” And it’s like that stoic philosophy. Like if you worry about it and it happens, you’ve just worried twice—like why suffer? So, we were talking about it like, “Man, we’ve got to raise our rates.” And it’s like months at a time and then finally it’s like, “OK guys, I’m announcing it now.” And you send that email out or message, a communication, you’re just waiting, and then nothing typically ever happens so you’re like, “OK, I’m good.” And then by the second one it’s more clear, more concise, like, “Hey, it’s going to happen.” So, it gets easier. But yeah, the first couple times you’re just like holding your breath waiting for it.

Mike Warkentin (05:45):
Yeah. And you didn’t solve the problem, so you didn’t lose your members, but you didn’t solve the problem where you said it didn’t really move the needle for the gym. And your story is very similar to what Chris Cooper had. His is slightly different than that. He had two different gyms where he had a group class gym and a personal training studio that was basically propping up the group class gym. It sounds like you had the same situation right inside one gym where you’ve got the one revenue stream that’s doing really well and the other one that’s kind of not doing so great. And I’m going to guess in your group classes—because this is what happened to me—you probably had like three or four people show up, and you were basically doing person training in a group class. Is that right?

Tim Rainer (06:18):
Yeah, and that’s what the mentor, Tim Caputo, really helped us with is figuring out it’s not a rate problem that we were dealing with; it’s a fundamental offering and business problem that we were dealing with.

Mike Warkentin (06:30):
And so this is a really interesting aspect because there are things where you can do, with a mentor’s help, just a rate increase on your existing products. And you can say, “My group classes are priced at 140, and they need to be 205. I need to add more value in, and I need to do this properly. I need to raise those rates.” And you can just do that. Or in other cases a mentor will look at the business model, and this is like—every business is unique. So, the mentor will look at your metrics, figure out what you need to do and then start looking at that model. And business models, we have a whole mess of them. We tailor them to each individual business. So, it’s not just rubber stamp, one-size-fits-all; it’s how do we make this business better? So, I want to get into how you did it, and you’ve got an interesting situation, but it’s not that dissimilar from everybody else who wanted to run big group classes, couldn’t because it’s really hard to do that, but you had a great personal training stream. So, talk to me about how Tim decided exactly what to do with your model and this most recent rate increase. This was January you did this, correct? And it was a big one.

Tim Rainer (07:26):
Yep, we … everything in January. Yeah, it was.

Mike Warkentin (07:28):
OK, give me the details. Let’s roll.

Tim Rainer (07:30):
So the biggest problem that we have—I don’t even know that’s in our area; it’s really probably just our business—is that we have offerings on two different ends. We have a group class offering at 200 a month, and we have personal training, at the time 89 an hour. So, for most people that’s 712 a month. And so, you have 200, and you have nearing 1,000 with some people training three or four times a week. And those are—it is just drastic. And the biggest thing that we had found is that yes, some of the small group, some of the large group 200 a month, will add on nutrition coaching or training or other services, but it still takes time, right? And it still doesn’t fix the fundamental issue. And so, the other thing is that when you look at adding an on-ramp to your business, it’s really tough because you’re going from personal training and someone that is working one-on-one and has a budget for $700 to $1,000 a month.

Tim Rainer (08:30):
And then if you’re doing a true on-ramp, they should be going into the group class, and now all of a sudden, you’re cutting that revenue from 1,000 to 200. And that’s tough because then not only does the member say, “Well, I’m paying for me, and I want to keep paying for me and my goals and my time and convenience, but I don’t really trust a $200 a month product when I’m getting your time exclusively for four or five times the cost.” And the way that that had went is our training revenue just kept increasing because there’s a lot of value to it. And that’s something that we personally service incredibly well. And we have great SOPs and great people and coaches that make people feel like this is working for them and their goals. And with the group classes, we kept finding that we were, at that price point, competing with the Orangetheories and Burn Boot Camps and the other services that, honestly, we will never be as good as because they just have the community; it’s built for it.

Tim Rainer (09:28):
Everyone that comes in there does that product offering. And so, really it’s: Are you competing with other franchises at their price point, and even CrossFit too, or are you personal training, and you’re kind of like a unicorn—you just do really great and people start to understand and know and refer their friends for it? And so, we looked at those two different options, right? No one in PT wants to drop down. The group, you’re competing. And what we’ve done historically is raise rates based on our feelings of “I don’t want to charge my training clients more money because this person’s paying $700, $800, and if I lose that person then I’ve now lost 8,000 a year, but I might increase them by $80 a month, so is it worth it? Probably not.” Which in reality, it is worth it because even if you lost someone, you could still pick someone up for more, right?

Tim Rainer (10:23):
Just talking realistically. So, what we looked at and Tim looked at with us is we need to make our offerings truer to personal training, which is the niche that we’re going towards and our revenue’s going towards. So, the way we did it is based off data, and historically it was on feelings. So, on the data side of it, we also at the time in January had a—we resigned our lease, which if no one tells you, it is very expensive to resign a lease and renegotiate it. And so, we went up by about $6 a square foot, which for 3,300 square feet is substantial, you know, $20,000 or so. And that’s immediately, if we don’t raise them, we’re just going to take that loss. So, on the training side of it, this was the first time we’d ever raised rates, and we went from 89 to 99 an hour.

Tim Rainer (11:23):
And on that side of it, we do about 350 training sessions a month, at the time. And so, the $10 increase literally on the numbers was a $3,500 increase a month. So, our operating expenses, our rent and our operating expenses went up about $1,600 a month. And then if we go off a 4/9ths model for service, that’s going to be about $1,500 a month. So, there’s 3,100 of the 3,500, and then of the extra 400, that’s essentially your taxes, your merchant fees, et cetera. So even at a $10 increase for 350 sessions a month, our margins are not any better. But we get to pay our coaches more, and we get to cover our bills and be more comfortable.

Mike Warkentin (12:09):
And I’m just going to jump in and just say, listeners, if you don’t know what the 4/9ths model is, the short version: You pay coaches 44% of gross revenue, and the gym keeps the rest, which is allocated between profit and fixed operating costs. Keep going.

Tim Rainer (12:24):
Yeah. And so, then that fixed our issue on the rate increase for resigning a lease—the cost of doing business, which is unfortunately high, especially in our area. And so, the other issue was with our coaches, our trainers, we’re paying them out $45 to $60 an hour for personal training. But then on the group side of it, we can only afford to pay about $25 an hour. And the way that it’s going to work out is just if a trainer can do a training session versus a group, it’s just not going to work. Right?

Mike Warkentin (12:59):
This happens to everyone. It’s so common.

Tim Rainer (13:01):
Yeah. And so, it just doesn’t make sense for them to be like, “Hey, you’re going to take five or six group classes because I don’t want to do it, and I can take a training client,” when they go, “Well what if I want to take one?” So, on the numbers side of it, we needed to look at: How do we get our group classes to match the payout of personal training? Realistically, we can’t just add 50 people to group classes in our space. It’s not going to work. And historically we haven’t done it, so why would we do it now? So, what we needed to do instead was look at the price point and work backwards from how we need to pay people out and how many people that looks like. And so, off of a 4/9ths model and off of just paying trainers what they deserve to be paid, that was $350 a month. And so, then we go from branding that is group class or larger group class to small group personal training. And in a lot of ways our members are looking at it from, “Yes, it’s a price increase, but now instead of ‘Who’s going to show up for the class?’ it goes to ‘This is the class, and these six to eight people are getting worked on with a personal trainer.’”

Mike Warkentin (14:14):
I’ve got to point something out here. This is like—this, listeners, is the main point of the show. Figured out what you wanted to make, then you went backwards and said, “How can I provide the value and service that justifies that rate?” Then you did it. People don’t do that normally. I sat there, I’m like—I did what you did. And I said, “Oh, I’ll just tack 10 bucks on or whatever.” It doesn’t work like that. If you want to figure out how to actually run your business, you’ve got to figure out what you want to make. What do you need to earn? What covers your bills; how do you make it happen? Then you start working backwards and saying, “How can I provide the value that justifies this?” And for you, it wasn’t group classes at $400 a month; it was small training classes where people are getting way more attention at a much better rate for everyone, and they’re happier because you said your clients want to get that attention, you are happier because you’re getting the money, and you just backfilled all the value. Is that how it worked? Have I got that right?

Tim Rainer (15:06):
Yeah, it went, it went pretty well. And I think the only reason that we could justify that is because when our members approach us, we have data that backs it up, and we have, “Well, this is where we’re going to, and this is why.” But if we were to just take that number and like, “Hey, here you go. Like it’s increased $150,” then all of a sudden everyone’s like, “Whoa, what is the difference?” So, it came down to understanding why and the value behind it and how we’re paying our trainers, understanding the benefits and communicating that to them, and knowing too, at this point, we don’t have to keep trying to source these members that are just looking for other options anyway. And we can focus more on these people for less.

Mike Warkentin (15:49):
Yeah, and listeners, I’ll just note here that our mentors have a plan, and it doesn’t include gigantic rate increases for the most part. Like in certain cases, if a gym is just dying and there’s no way to save it, but going for a larger increase, maybe that has to happen. Those situations are rare. What’s more common is for our mentors to plan out, if it has to be a large fix, a stepwise increase so that you don’t shock people all the way. But again, this is tailored to the business, the individual business. Sometimes it’s just a 7% increase to cover inflation and things like that. Other times, if a business is in real trouble, you might need to go 25%, but it might have to happen in two steps or something like that. But know that there is a specific plan, and our mentors have the data and the tactics to know exactly how to execute it and to make the numbers work according to what you need to make and not lose your clients. So, I’ve got to ask you about that. How did you communicate this value to your clients, and did you lose any?

Tim Rainer (16:40):
Yeah, so, we basically sent out an email to everyone, just very clear, concise, not overthinking, “Hey, this is the reason why this is changing. These are some of the numbers behind it.” Again, very brief. “If you have questions, concerns, talk to us directly. We’re happy to answer it.” We lost shockingly few, maybe two or three people. And honestly of those couple people, I kind of say, if you’re going to raise a rate and someone leaves because of that immediately, they were probably looking for a way out anyway.

Mike Warkentin (17:11):
They sure were. Yep.

Tim Rainer (17:12):
Just realistically because we can make it work for them. And so, yeah, it went fairly well. And the one side of it is kind of what I was thinking of is there’s this dichotomy of being a gym owner, and it’s “How can I help everyone?” And then at some point it’s like, “I can’t help everyone because I’m focused on these people.” And especially raising rates from that much, it immediately rules out people with a lower budget, and you can’t really work with them as much. So, it’s tough. But on the business side of it, you also need to look at, “Well, if I increase by this amount, what percent of people can I lose?” And it is unfortunate, but it’s true. So, it’s like, “Well, if we go from 30 people and I increase by this much, now I can still have 20, and I can lose 10, and I can have the same revenue for less people.”

Mike Warkentin (18:02):
We actually have this whole thing laid, listeners, mentors help people go through it. And you actually go through your client list and it’s like: Green check marks are staying no matter what. And you know, yellow check marks are like, I’m not quite sure. Red Xs are probably going to leave no matter what. And you do the math. If I lose these eight red check marks, but my rates more than cover that, that’s great because I am making more money. And everyone who comes in now, comes in at a new rate that’s sustainable for the business. Everything works. So again, this is not just whimsical throw stuff in the air like I was doing in 2013. This is documented, spreadsheets, tactics, do the analysis, and it almost always works out perfectly because the owners know, “These clients are fine. These ones are maybe OK, and I can convince them of the value. These ones are gone no matter what.” You do the math, and then you make smart increases. Do you remember some of the language that you said—and I know that you said the email was brief, but I’m curious—what did you say to when you’re like—a model shift is a big deal where you’re no longer running these group classes; you’re going to like a small group training model at a higher rate. Do you remember what you said by chance?

Tim Rainer (19:02):
In the rate increase, it’s essentially, “Hey, this is great news. We have resigned our lease.”

Tim Rainer (19:10):
“Unfortunately that comes with a major increase in the cost of doing business. We haven’t really increased our rates—we haven’t increased our rates on training in three years, and the group classes are $10 a year, so they haven’t really increased dramatically, but it’s time for a dramatic increase, and this is the reason why. Let us know if you have questions, concerns, et cetera.” As far as the group specifically, which I’ve sure most people are more interested in, it’s essentially, “Hey, we’re taking this product, and now we are going to small group personal training, and instead of looking for people to just come in and just do the workout and leave, our trainers are now going to get paid more.” And I did mention our trainers will be getting paid extra now to keep up with what they deserve to be paid. And I think that that goes a long way too because then people are like, “Oh, my trainer is making more, not like this money’s going right to their pockets,” because that’s hardly ever true. And then it just—“Now we’re going to focus all in on you six, and this is the cost of that, so now we’re not sourcing.”

Mike Warkentin (20:21):
There it is. That’s the value.

Tim Rainer (20:22):
Yeah. Scarcity and value all drive a price.

Mike Warkentin (20:27):
Yeah, like what you said there—and again, listeners, we have our mentors help our clients write these letters, and we don’t go into the graphic endless details of justification of being defensive. There is a playbook for how we roll these things out. We know the language, keep it simple and direct, and you build the value. And what you said there is, “We’re focusing on building a sustainable gym that you guys can come to for the next 20 years as opposed to a rickety ship that’s going to sink in a week. We’re paying our coaches more because they’re amazing, and they are now focused on fewer of you to get better results faster. And the rates are going up.” Yeah, the rates are going up, right? And like people are like, “Well it makes sense. I’m getting better results; my coaches are paid better.” There’s like—pan over, if you don’t mind, to your gym for a sec, so people can check this out. Can you just turn the camera again and show people what you got going on there? It’s a sweet space. Right? Like, look at that. That’s awesome. What a clean looking place. It looks pro.

Tim Rainer (21:17):
We try to be clean. And then we got a park out here we’re attached to. So yeah, it’s—we try to put everything into the clients truly. So.

Mike Warkentin (21:28):
And you built the value and that’s the key. And again, it’s not just whimsical; it is actually a system, and we know how to tell people how to build value. Think about this if you’re listening. If your rates are low and you know it, the cost of mentorship would be more than paid for by a solid rate increase that gets you where you need to be. Think about that, and you can book a call in our show notes later on if you want to talk to someone about that. When you sent this letter out, big rate increase; again, it’s your fourth one. So, you’ve done—you’ve had some experience, but this is a big one and a model shift. Were your hands sweaty? How did this go?

Tim Rainer (21:58):
Yeah, but I think that we were mostly—I think that the biggest thing that our mentor, Tim, has brought us is confidence. You know, I think that a mentor’s role is to make sure that your short-term habits, your business, lines up with the long-term vision of where you’re going. And for him it’s like we’re telling him month after month, “Man, this part just isn’t working our business, and this part isn’t working, and I’m not going to build an on-ramp for training at this cost to just put people in group.” And, and even for him, his business is very similar to ours, and it just is like something’s not adding up. And so, at some point he goes, “OK, we need to build efficiencies. We need to change this.” And now it’s like—everything that you go through on the on-ramp for Two-Brain, when we first started, it didn’t make sense to us. And now it’s like, it makes sense. If someone comes in, you’re doing personal training so that we can get to build a relationship. We can work on you and your goals, and now you can keep that, or we can transition you to small group personal training, which is still a much higher level of accountability than group. And so, everything just makes more sense now.

Mike Warkentin (23:11):
Yeah. And when clients—listeners, when you come into Two-Brain, you’re going to come in and you’re going to get a whole bunch of foundational stuff. And some of it’s going to seem tedious, right? Like creating business systems isn’t the sexiest thing in the world, but everything that you’re doing is creating the foundation for a business that’s going to last for 30 years, pay you at least 100 grand a year, and let you live the life that you want. So, some of the stuff there, you’ve got to do some work, get your hands dirty, but you’re going to push through it really quickly. It doesn’t take that long to do it. And the intro program is set up to give you a bunch of quick wins so that you are actually making better money right away. And part of that is coming from structuring your offer and your pricing. That is addressed, helping you market and get clients. So that stuff all happens right on intake now. How essential, Tim, is a mentor in this process?

Tim Rainer (23:52):
We wouldn’t have done so many things that are, at this point, you just look and you’re like, “I should have done this years ago.” And for the record, we had a great gym. We have a great gym, and we were profitable every year, but there were just things missing, and there were things that my wife and I, we try to control too much, like cleaning. We didn’t hire a cleaner, and the first month we were with Tim, he’s like, “Hire a cleaner,” and we haven’t looked back since.

Mike Warkentin (24:20):
You just took the rubber gloves off and walked. Hey, I love it.

Tim Rainer (24:22):
Yeah. And, we were like, “Man, should we do this?” And he’s like, “Do it right now.” And it’s just some of those little votes of confidence of like, “Yes, do this.” Like everything is telling you, but your brain just emotionally is like, “Nope. It’s going to look like crap. Floor’s not going to be clean.” And then it’s—you’re illogical when you are an owner-operator in the business, and you’re focused on it, and you care about it, and having a mentor who’s looking at these things like, “No, look. This is what you should do,” it’s the extra vote of confidence to be like, “OK, I’m in the right direction. This is my next step, and am I doing the things that are going to line up long term with where we’re going?”

Mike Warkentin (25:08):
Drop the mop and sell some PT, Tim. Right? That’s kind of what happened.

Tim Rainer (25:12):
Seriously. Seriously. Yeah.

Mike Warkentin (25:14):
Yeah, so as we close this guy out, if a gym owner’s thinking about raising rates—because there’s someone listening right now, and they know that their business is in trouble, and they need to raise their rates, but they don’t know what to do—what’s your advice?

Tim Rainer (25:26):
Well, immediately, you need to break down your business, and you need to see exactly where you’re at. And you need to make a plan to go backwards and reverse engineer to be where you want to be, right? That’s step one. And a lot of times, businesses have different inefficiencies, like staff turnover, not getting enough members. I mean, the Simple Six—right, ARM, LEG, ROI, headcount, et cetera—kind of explains what’s wrong with your business, and you need to look there and see: What do I need to make, and how do I go backwards from it? But really, I mean, I tell people more and more, we’re in the business of coaching. Hire a coach. Education is free. You can find everything you’d ever want on the internet. And if you could do that, you wouldn’t need someone like Two-Brain to tell you what to do and how to do it. Coaching is expensive, so it’s also worth it. Within our first probably three weeks of Two-Brain, we had already covered our membership plus more.

Mike Warkentin (26:26):
Are you serious?

Tim Rainer (26:27):
Oh yeah, easily. And since then, full transparency, we had gone in December of maybe mid 20s to 30, touching 30,000 a couple months, and we’ll finish this month over 40. And that’s like 15, 16 months in. So, and it’s just a lot of things that are really simple: clarifying your offer, getting your niche down, and talking to someone who knows your business outside of it and can help get you where you want to go.

Mike Warkentin (26:58):
So “Simple Six,” Tim mentioned—that is one of Chris Cooper’s many books. You can get it. I’ll put a link in the show notes for you. You can get that on Amazon. Check it out. You’re going to find all sorts of stuff in there that you can do to analyze your business and make it better. I’ll tell you this, if that book hits home, but you’re just not sure how to do it, you owe it to yourself to take the next step, which is book a call and talk to someone about how mentorship can help you. And you’re not going to get a hardcore sales pitch. You’re going to get an analysis saying, “Your business could use this. We can help you with this.” And they’ll explain things for you and lay out the path forward. And like Tim’s saying, you’re going to get ROI on your investment. Like, Tim, it wasn’t really a cost if you made all that money back right away, hey?

Tim Rainer (27:34):
Yeah, it’s like a coach; it’s an asset and not a cost and not a liability. If you make money off of it, it is an asset, 100%.

Mike Warkentin (27:43):
There you go. I’m super pumped, Tim. Thanks so much for being here, and I’m excited that you’ve covered the cost of that sweet space, and you’re going forward. We’ll have you back in a bit, and we’ll see where you are. Thank you so much.

Tim Rainer (27:54):
Thanks. Appreciate it.

Mike Warkentin (27:55):
If you’re thinking about raising rates, get “The Simple Six.” Then book a call with our team, and we’ll help you talk about it. That was Tim Rainer. This is “Run a Profitable Gym.” This is where the world’s best gym owners tell you exactly what they’re doing so that you can have the same success. Please subscribe on your way out so that you don’t miss a single show. And if you’re on YouTube, I’d love it if you would hit “like” on the button; that would be fantastic as well. And now here’s Chris Cooper with a final message.

Chris Cooper (28:19):
Hey, it’s Two-Brain founder Chris Cooper with a quick note. We created the Gym Owners United Facebook group to help you run a profitable gym. Thousands of gym owners, just like you have already joined. In the group, we share sound advice about the business of fitness every day. I answer questions, I run free webinars, and I give away all kinds of great resources to help you grow your gym. I’d love to have you in that group. It’s Gym Owners United on Facebook, or go to gymownersunited.com to join. Do it today.

The post The Rate Increase: Exactly How Fit One Five Got It Right appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

How One Mentor Created Almost $10 Million in Gym Revenue

One of our mentors has done 81 rate increases with clients over the years.

Guess how many businesses lost all their clients and went under.

The answer: zero.

Instead, all the clients who worked with mentor Greg Strauch took assertive, calculated steps to stabilize their gyms and provide for their families.

I’ll do some quick math for you: Let’s lowball it and suggest that each of those gyms increased rates by $20 a month on about 150 clients. (This is probably low: In just one case, Greg did a rate increase of about $25 in a gym with 300 members, and some of Greg’s clients increase rates every year as part of their annual plans.)

An additional $20 a month paid by 150 clients is $3,000 in new revenue in each gym, and that’s $243,000 across all 81 businesses. Multiply that by 12 months and you get $2.92 million in additional revenue in a year.

Greg’s been helping clients raise rates for six years, so let’s multiply $2.92 million by just three years. That’s $8.76 million in revenue tied to a rate increase—and the figure is growing with every month that passes.

Wow, right?

So what would happen if you took action to ensure your rates reflect your value?

$15 a Month Over Three Years

Think about this:

It’s June 2021, and one of Greg’s clients does a $15 increase on a monthly rate of $190. The new rate is $205 for 160 clients—$2,400 drops right to the bottom line every month, allowing the owner to cover some costs—including the cost of mentorship—and take $1,500 more in salary every month.

Over the next year, the business takes in $28,800 in gross revenue related just to the rate increase, with $18,000 of that directed to the owner as personal income.

Fast-forward to today, and the totals are $86,400 gross and $54,000 personal.

And here’s something else to remember: Greg’s clients didn’t bleed members when the increases went into place. Some didn’t lose any, and all owners more than covered the cost of departures with the increases.

In most cases, Greg’s clients started the process by adding new members at the increased rate before adjusting prices for current members—it wasn’t an increase for newbies; it was just “the rate,” and it reflected the value of coaching. That gave them more income right away and the confidence to address rates for existing members.

It should be obvious that a small increase becomes huge over time.

So if you know you’re due for a rate increase, you would be wise to address the issue now so you aren’t sitting here in a year and calculating how much money you could have taken in.

Get Help

Greg walks through all the steps of a great rate increase in an episode of “Run a Profitable Gym.”

All the info is there, with our compliments.

But here’s the key: Greg helped every single client implement a very precise plan, complete with checklists, templates, pre-written messaging and done-for-you resources. His clients followed the instructions, stuck to the timeline, leaned on him for support and got great results.

I want your rates to reflect your value, but I don’t want you to raise them without a plan. You can make very bad mistakes—such as raising rates more than 15 percent, failing to implement a clear communication plan with staff and clients, or announcing the increase too far away from the date it takes effect.

If you’re planning a rate increase, get help. (Two-Brain clients, your mentor can direct you to the resources you need in the Growth Toolkit and help you create a plan of action.)

If you don’t have someone in your corner, I’d advise you to proceed with great caution. I don’t want you to slip up; rate increases are very tricky if you don’t have a lot of experience with them.

The best thing you can do to avoid mistakes is book a call to talk about mentorship. A well-crafted rate increase can more than cover the cost of mentorship, and it can ensure the long-term success of your business.

One of the things a mentor will provide is accountability. You’ll get a plan and someone to hold you to it.

Try this right now: Add 5 to 10 percent to your current rates and multiply the dollar value of the increase by current client count. Then multiply by 12.

What’s the number? And would your business and your family be better of if that money were in your bank accounts in a year?

What happens if you don’t take action this year?

To find out more about the plan that’s worked for 100 percent of Greg Strauch’s clients and hundreds of additional gym owners around the world, click here.

The post How One Mentor Created Almost $10 Million in Gym Revenue appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

How to Screw up a Gym Rate Increase

We’ve done rate increases with literally hundreds of gyms—one mentor alone has done 81 of them.

Over the years, we’ve identified a host of avoidable mistakes and helped owners take the right steps to improve their businesses.

Here are the screwups to avoid at all costs:

1. Not Being Worth It

If clients can’t tell the difference between you and the other CrossFit gym or yoga studio, they’re going to choose the cheapest option. You can’t raise your rates “just because.” Clients should have a clear impression that you’ve been undercharging (usually for years). Follow our template to explain your position—very briefly—and build value without apologizing for raising rates.

2. Apologizing

If you write a long, tear-jerking email, your clients will feel as if they’re doing you a favor by helping you out instead of paying the fair price for the value they receive. The last thing you want is clients thinking you owe them a favor. We have battle-tested language we provide to help clients get to the point without making withdrawals from the emotional bank account.

3. Failing to Get Staff on Board

Talk to your team before the rate increase happens. Tell them why it’s necessary and how it will help them long term (but don’t promise them raises). Two-Brain clients: Use our template.

Staff members need to hear two things: A. The rate increase is necessary to grow the gym and help more people (including them); B. All client questions and concerns should come straight to you in person. It’s not the coaches’ job to explain or to disrupt classes to deal with “feedback.” And you want clients talking to you so you don’t get the “everybody’s mad!” message from your staff.

4. Running a “Townhall Meeting”

Clients will think your business is a democracy and that you’ll weigh their opinions on all decisions. It’s not a democracy; it’s a business. Clients have already voted with their credit cards. They are paying you to make these decisions, not to collect votes. Nothing positive can come from a townhall, but you can stir up a lot of negatives.

5. Making Promises About the Money

One of the biggest mistakes people make is saying, “We need money for more equipment!” Then clients will look for the new equipment. When you buy it, you’ll have more equipment but make the same money.

For example, when CrossFit HQ raised affiliate fees, it said, “We’ll use the money for more marketing.” Now, instead of measuring the value of affiliation or the value of the brand, affiliates keep asking “where’s the marketing we were promised?”

6. Taking Advice From People Who Haven’t Raised Rates

Common misconceptions from the ringside gurus: “If you’re delivering top value, people will see it,” and, “People want to pay more if you have more coaching certifications.” Likewise, don’t take advice from clients and staff who have never owned businesses: They’re likely to say “drop your prices and get more clients!” because they don’t know what you know.

7. Going Backward

The worst mistake I’ve ever seen was when a gym owner screwed up No. 3 above and her staff led a revolt. Instead of saying, “OK, I’ve lost some clients, but I’ll build from here with the right prices,” the owner took it all back, cancelled the rate increase and eventually closed her gym. Who was the winner in that situation? Answer: No one.

8. Looking at the Wrong Metrics

Gyms that raise their rates often go backward in client headcount (a little) but take a leap forward in revenue. And it’s revenue that pays the bills and the coaches and the owner, not how many clients you have.

9. Not Taking the Long View

In the moment, it’s hard to take client pushback on rate increases. But if you don’t make the move, are you really going to be around in five years? Ten years? Will the complaining clients still be members in a decade? Probably not—but your business will still be going strong because you did the hard things required to ensure its success.

Get Expert Help to Minimize Pain

Look, you’re probably going to lose some clients when you increase rates.

But think about who these clients are:

They’re often the price shoppers who didn’t understand your value when they signed up and are always likely to leave for discounts somewhere else.They’re probably the biggest complainers (not always, but it’s amazing how often the people who complain about one thing are just looking for an excuse to make a big statement).They’re usually people who are looking for any reason to leave. If it isn’t a rate increase that pushes them out, it will be the cancellation of the 10 a.m. class (which they never attend).

If you take a small step backward in client headcount but make more money, that’s a win because every new client will pay the new rates and won’t care about the drama.

And our mentors have an exact calculation to help you determine your overall revenue boost even if all the “likely leavers” depart when you announce your increase. (In many cases, the likely leavers actually end up staying because the owner handled delivery of the increase so well.)

My best advice is to do the increase with help and support from a mentor, turn the page and move on.

Short-term pain is definitely worth the long-term reward. And if you get expert help, you’ll have far less pain for a much greater reward.

The post How to Screw up a Gym Rate Increase appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

Gym Rate Increases: 3 Essential Tips

Thinking about raising rates?

Or maybe you know you must raise rates to stabilize your gym business.

Either way, here’s what you need to hear:

It’s OK to raise your rates.

Doing so will ensure your business stays open. That means you’ll be able to provide for your family, continue to help your clients and ensure you’re creating careers for your coaches.

Here’s something else you need to hear:

Two-Brain has an exact plan to help gym owners raise rates: It involves some basic math, checklists, timelines, downloadable resources and support from a mentor.

It’s been tested and optimized over the years, and it’s been used with great success by hundreds of gym owners. The plan works, and at most gyms, even a small rate increase will more than pay for the cost of mentorship. (Two-Brain clients: Everything you need to increase rates can be found in the Toolkit. Click here.)

Here, I’ll lay out the three key principles of rate increases.

1. Follow a Plan

When it comes to rate increases, it’s unwise to wing it and hope for the best.

The right rate-increase procedure will reduce or eliminate backlash completely and ensure your updated fees support your business.

Without a plan, here are a just few things that can happen:

You can raise rates too much and anger clients.You can raise rates too little and fail to solve your cash-flow problems.You can get the timing wrong if you need a two- or three-step process to get the correct rates in place.You can fall prey to random, untested, “here’s what I did” advice that might not be sound or might not apply to your unique business.You can upset your staff members.You can lose a lot of sleep.You can put off an obviously needed rate increase until you’re in an emergency situation that forces you to take desperate measures.You can go under because you were too scared to raise your rates.

If you don’t have a solid plan, a mentor can provide one.

2. Be Worth It

Imagine your accountant is constantly over-delivering. She’s always checking in on you, sending helpful tips and resources, and spotting issues before you do.

She knows about your family and sends thoughtful gifts from time to time to show her appreciation for you. She refers great clients to your gym.

She doesn’t just crunch your numbers. She actually cares about you and your business, and it shows in everything she does.

One day, she sends you an email and mentions her rates will be going up by 8 percent. How do you react?

You probably just think, “That’s fair. I’m getting incredible value.”

Imagine you get the same rate-increase message from an accountant who’s always screwing up, filing reports late and “missing” your important emails.

When he sends you the message, you think, “I was unsatisfied before—and now I have to pay more?”

You must be like the first accountant. That means constantly building and demonstrating value. If your clients know you’re always putting them first, they won’t bat an eye at a rate increase.

Remember: A client’s experience is only as good as the last exposure. Make sure every exposure is A+ and then rest easy when you hit “send” on the rate-increase email.

3. Build Value Every Day

A price increase at the discount barn is annoying because you go there for one reason: cheap prices.

An increase at the best store in town goes mostly unnoticed because you aren’t there for low prices. You’re there for everything the business does to earn the “best in town” reputation.

Be the best: Don’t give discounts or have sales. Price fluctuations erode trust and encourage price shopping. Consistency is more important than anything else. Be confident in your prices and your value and resist the urge to slash prices. Deliver the same great value every day to every client.

Beyond that, know who your clients are. Your best clients likely come from the top 10 percent of professionals in your area. Stop projecting your own budget onto them. They’re willing to pay for the value you deliver. Build your prices, staff needs and purchases—your entire business—with these great people in mind. Solve their problems and they’ll be happy to hand you money each month.

Then recruit clients who are similar and dote on them, too. Refer others to another gym where they can play the nickel-and-dime game. Screen out the clients who don’t fit so you have the time and energy to deliver outstanding, industry-leading value to a smaller group of people.

Clients who receive great value won’t flee when you increase rates. They’ll be happy you’re taking steps to ensure the gym that’s helping them stay healthy remains open for decades.

Need More Help?

Our certified mentors have a precise process for implementing rate increases.

They help clients calculate the exact increase that’s needed, retain “at-risk” members, and inform staff and clients. Our toolkit includes checklists, templates and timelines, and our support system can help you get over your nerves when you’re making a key move to improve your business and your life.

It’s OK to raise your rates—but it’s not OK to fly by the seat of your pants.

If you need help fixing your business, let’s talk.

The post Gym Rate Increases: 3 Essential Tips appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

How to Avoid Losing Time for Years

“It will take too long to explain. I’ll just do it myself.”

This mentality is common in entrepreneurs.

We’re impatient, Type A people who push hard and want to cross things off our lists. So the thought of slowing down and teaching someone is painful.

If a task takes us 10 minutes to do personally but 30 to delegate, we usually handle the task fast and move on. 

But you can see where this is going: If you do the task more than three times, you should have invested time to offload it in the first place.

Here’s a CEO experiment for you:

Think of a longer word you type regularly—at least several times a day.

It could be the name of your business, or maybe it’s “barbell back squat” or something similar. For me, it’s “Two-Brain Business.” I probably use that name 20 times a day.

Now set up a macro or keyboard shortcut for that word. This is just a simple abbreviation that triggers your computer to make a replacement. On laptop, I’ve used a program called TextExpander for years.

You can also set up replacements through MacOS, Android, Word, Excel and so on.

For example, if I type “Tbb”—a combination you’d never hit in any word—I automatically get the words “Two-Brain Business.’” That saves me 14 keystrokes and a hyphen.

That might seem silly, but the keystrokes add up—especially if you add in a typo and backspace. And it’s not always about the time; it’s the speed. Instead of having to slow my brain down to type a long proper noun, I hammer three keys and push ahead with the thought.

I’ve made longer replacements, too. I have a two-keystroke combo that spits out an entire rejection letter for submitted articles at a previous job.

This stuff has saved me a ton of time over the years.

But get this: Every time I consider setting up a replacement, I think, “Nah. I’ll just type it out this time. It’ll be faster.”

But it’s not faster. I know this. I’m just being impatient and refusing to invest.

So do the experiment. And if you find that “Bfn” is a pleasing workaround for “Bob’s World-Class Fitness and Nutrition Services Inc.,” start creating macros in your gym, too.

“Gym Macros”

In a gym business, macros and text replacements are SOPs—checklists, pre-made decisions and if/then executions.  

These documents, collected in a staff playbook, are actually “you” in written form. They are the owner’s instructions presented in the clearest possible way so any staff member—long term or brand new—can figure out exactly how to do something to an A+ standard.

If you’ve ever used a thumbs-up emoji, you know that shortcuts save time. That’s true even if it takes you a few minutes to set up the shortcut the first time.

So start systemizing your business today to reclaim time every day for the next decade.

What are the exact steps to systemizing a gym?

Chris Cooper’s written about this in detail. Check it out here.

The post How to Avoid Losing Time for Years appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

Simple Income-Boosting Tactics From a Top-Earning Gym Owner

Mike Warkentin (00:02):
Imagine paying yourself $16,000 to $38,000 U.S. per month for the last three months. Some gym owners are doing that, and we’re going to find out exactly how they did it today on “Run a Profitable Gym.” I’m your host, Mike Warkentin. Please hit “subscribe” so you don’t miss a show. We give away gold from the best gym owners in the world every single week, and you can literally improve your business if you listen and take one action after the show. So, dig in; please subscribe. Now, net owner benefit: It’s salary, dividends, and anything extra that your gym pays you. It’s a key metric. We track it over a three-month period, and we present one month so that we show sustainable numbers, not flash-in-the-pan, one-hit-wonder, massive dividend payments. These are sustainable regular numbers. And our March leaderboard went from 16,000 to 38,000 U.S. Darren Thornton is the owner of Defy Functional Fitness in Toronto. He’s been on the show before. He’s back because he made our leaderboard for March. And we’re going to dig into his numbers so he can tell you exactly how he did it. Darren, welcome from Toronto. How are you today?

Darren Thornton (00:59):
I’m good; thanks, Mike. How are you?

Mike Warkentin (01:01):
I’m great. I love, as I said before the show, reconnecting with people who have been on this show before because we get to see where you’ve been and where you’re going, and it’s always up, up, up, and it’s really exciting. So, I’m going to dig in and give you some questions here, and let’s help some gym owners. You ready?

Darren Thornton (01:15):
Absolutely.

Mike Warkentin (01:15):
Alright. So, before the show—I’m going to read the quote—you said this: “I’m only performing high-value roles, and a high average revenue per member gives me a better net owner benefit.” So, tell me: How have you created the time to focus on increasing average revenue per member? Because it’s really tough to do it when you’re scrubbing a toilet and there’s fires raging.

Darren Thornton (01:33):
Yeah, and I’ve been there, and I think like most people, I started a gym a similar way. I was a coach, I was a CrossFit coach, I was competing in CrossFit, and the goal was to always own a gym. And then when you do own the gym, you start to realize things are maybe not as simple as what it looks like from the coaching floor. So very, very quickly and early on I realized that I needed to get off the coaching floor. Obviously, we were also cleaning, as you mentioned, scrubbing toilets. We were doing all of these jobs, and I just realized that I actually quickly started to detest coaching purely because it took me away from doing the things that I knew my business needed to grow. Right? So, the goal really was: Can I make myself not needed in this business, and how do I go about that? And I don’t think it’s totally doable from 100%. You still have to perform these high value roles that we’re talking about, and that’s really being a CEO of a business. And if I introduce myself as “Oh, I’m CEO of Defy Wellness,” I think that people would have a different perspective than, “Oh, I’m a gym owner.”

Mike Warkentin (02:39):
They sure would.

Darren Thornton (02:41):
Right? And I don’t think that people kind of understand what needs to go into being a gym owner and really doing it properly. Being a CEO, you know, other goals were to create careers for coaches that I didn’t have the opportunity to have when I was a coach. So there needs to be somebody at the helm doing those jobs. So, it was really just starting the process of “How can we keep hiring good people?” which is so key to this, but I’ve also done it earlier than my metrics look like I could have done, right? So, I would sacrifice some growth to make sure we get the right person. Then when we find the right person or if the right person comes along at different points, I would try to get them in the business as quickly as possible and then really build things for them because it’s kind of hard to do it the other way around. Right.

Mike Warkentin (03:30):
And I’ll say that—you know, you said, “sacrificed growth.” What I’ll suggest is that you invested instead of sacrificing; you invested right there some money for a reward down the line because you are getting a great person who allows you to then climb up and do other stuff, right?

Darren Thornton (03:44):
Absolutely. Yeah. And it’s one of those things where if you keep doing all the things by yourself, there’s a limit to where you can grow, right? But if you have six people doing those things at the same time, then that limit becomes a lot bigger, and it allows everybody to get what Chris Cooper talks about a lot, “Let’s build that pie nice and big so everyone can have a nice big slice of it.” Right?

Mike Warkentin (04:08):
Was it hard to make that transition from “I’m a coach, and I teach the squad, and I’m at the 5 a.m. class” to “I’m a CEO, and I hire and grow the business”? How did you do that?

Darren Thornton (04:18):
I think I’ve always been entrepreneurial at heart. There’s a story from my parents’ wedding when I was like four years old. I was charging people to hang their coats up. So, I think I had a little bit of it in me and probably from my father. He’s always run his business since he was like 16 years old. So, there’s always been a little bit of that inside of me, but in terms of some of the skills, understanding how to hire people, getting caught up in “I don’t know how to do this,” so paralysis-by-analysis kind of thing. And you know, that’s where Two-Brain comes in where you have a mentor, and you can kind of just bounce those ideas off, speak to people who’ve done things in the past. There’s a ton of data within Two-Brain that we can always look at and see, which are really good ways to go. So, I think utilizing a little bit of what I think is a bit of an entrepreneurial spirit that I think you can definitely kindle, but it helps if you’ve got it inside you. And then also just looking at what other people have done, bouncing ideas off people and taking some of the industry best practices to get the best result.

Mike Warkentin (05:19):
So I’m going to ask you about a best practice: the value ladder exercise. Did you do it specifically, or was this something that you did that you didn’t know the name of it?

Darren Thornton (05:27):
Yeah, I think—look, I’ve been in Two-Brain now for six years. I’m not sure it was even called the value ladder back then.

Mike Warkentin (05:33):
Old school. Yeah.

Darren Thornton (05:34):
But it was more so just looking at the roles of “What can I pay somebody to do something where then I can do that higher value role to earn that money back that I would pay somebody?” right? So, if I can pay a cleaner 20, 30 bucks an hour, whatever that number is in your particular area, then how can I make two or three times that in the next hour. Is that cold calling people, calling hot leads, getting No Sweat Intros in? At some points that was delivering a personal training session because that was a better use of my time than cleaning the gym. And then as you just keep ascending up the ladder and you can keep finding—as we always go back to—getting good people, then you can look at “What are the next things?” So, I might spend an hour writing a blog post, which doesn’t necessarily give a direct ROI in that moment, but doing that for the last five years, every single week or two times a week or whatever, now we can start to see that trickling down. So, kind of thinking about these further down the line: What’s going to build the brand? What’s going to get our name out there? And trying to do those roles as opposed to the ones that I can hire people for.

Mike Warkentin (06:45):
So listeners, I’m going to lay out the value ladder for you. Darren just did it. I’m going to give you the bullet points, and if you take action on this right now and click out of this show, you will make more money. Here it is. Take your roles and tasks, everything you do in the entire day or the week and the month, and you just list them all: cleaner, coach, programmer, everything. Log how many hours that you spend in each role. Then from there, you’re just going to assign a dollar value, a fair market replacement cost, for those hours. So, like a cleaner: I spend five hours a week as a cleaner, I’m going to pay a cleaner $20 an hour, and my replacement cost then is going to be 200 bucks or whatever it was. Now you freed up 20 hours or whatever the number is.

Mike Warkentin (07:27):
In those 20 hours, can you find the way to invest your time and make more than you’re paying the cleaner so that you have some profit? Yes, you can. And Darren just said it. If I clean and I take an hour, and I pay someone $20 to clean for me, and I sell that hour at $75 for personal training, I now have a profit of $55, right? I’m ahead. That’s the principle. And you can apply this all throughout your business. It goes from coaching, programming, general managing—all of a sudden, you’re a CEO where you might work four hours a month overseeing your business and making about 30 grand from that business. That’s what our top gym owners are doing. So, if you take action on this right now, I won’t be mad if you click out of this show because that’s exactly what Darren did, and it does work. Darren, I’m going to ask you this: So now that we’ve talked about how you found the time to work on average revenue per member, what did you do to increase it? Because it’s great to say, “Oh, I’d like to drive up my average revenue per member.” What are the exact tactics you used to get your number way up high?

Darren Thornton (08:22):
Yeah, so I think we had a—last time I was on the podcast, we really dug deep into ARM, which I think was back in March last year, so March 2023. And it’s really just solving client’s problems, right? So, what problem does a client have? How can I solve that? So, for us, what we offer primarily is personal training, right? So that’s one-on-one personal training.

Mike Warkentin (08:47):
High value.

Darren Thornton (08:48):
And then that then rolls down into maybe two-on-one or three-on-one and eventually into some group classes as well. So, usually the best way to help someone with any of their goals is through one-on-one personal training. Now, and that’s the same with mentorship. That’s why we do one-on-one mentorship as opposed to big, large group mentorship because everybody has individual problems. Now when it comes to fitness, there might be a point where they get to a certain expertise, a certain level if you will, and the group program then makes more sense, right? And they can do that from a comradery standpoint, have people to work out with, that kind of stuff. So primarily we work on personal training, which is obviously a higher cost service than group training. We have nutrition coaching, which is—you know, we also do that very high level, very one-to-one very specific.

Darren Thornton (09:39):
We’re fortunate. My wife is a family physician who’s also our nutrition coach. So, in terms of expertise in that realm, there’s not very much that you can get better. So, we can charge a premium on that because we’re giving premium service. We also deliver specialty courses. So, I think in the early days of CrossFit gyms, you have mobility, weightlifting, group classes, gymnastics classes, and everything’s included in this umbrella membership of unlimited CrossFit, right? The problem is not everybody wants mobility, not everybody wants weightlifting, not everybody wants this. So, what we quickly did is realize, like, “Let’s give everybody what they want,” which is group training predominantly for us. We’re not a CrossFit gym, but we do strength and conditioning training. And then if you want to do weightlifting or you want to do gymnastics, then we can do specialty coach courses there, which we can then obviously charge for because the people who want it need it and they value it.

Mike Warkentin (10:31):
There’s your exercise listeners. If you’re still here, this is your second exercise: You take a look at your clients. “How can I solve problems for my clients faster?” Because speed is more valuable. So, if you’re just selling group fitness, you could probably solve that person’s problem. Think about a client who can’t do snatches or double-unders or muscle-ups or whatever it is. Could that client move faster towards the goal if that person worked one-on-one with you? Of course. Is that one-on-one service worth more? Yes. So, your first step might be to just say to a group class member, “Dude, I know you’re struggling with muscle ups. If you book a one-on-one session with me, I think we can make some huge progress. Cool?” He says, “Yes.” You tack on $75. You now have created a group class membership plus an additional one-on-one session; that’s called a hybrid membership in many circles.

Mike Warkentin (11:19):
You can now market this thing and say, “I’m selling one extra session, personal training, per month with your group membership.” Your ARM goes up. I’ve seen it in gyms. The ARM usually boosts from like say 160 to like 240, which is a huge, huge deal. And then the other thing that you might start looking at is your entire model for your business, just like Darren has and says, “You know what? I’m going to focus on personal training, nutrition. Those are both super, super valuable services and some group.” And group is the discount offering in that. There’s nothing wrong with it, but it’s not as fast; it’s not going to get results as fast as the other two combined. So, look at how you can solve problems for clients, put together packages in place so that they do it very quickly, and you’re going to make more money on that. That’s your second exercise. Darren, I got this one for you. Tell us a little bit about your business. You’ve given us a few things about what you’re focused on. You obviously know exactly what you’re selling to who. What else have you got? How much space, how many staff members? Give us the 411 on your business in Toronto.

Darren Thornton (12:14):
Yeah, so we have a 3,500 square foot space. We’re in sort of premium retail space, so we pay a lot for it, unfortunately. About 2,700 feet of that is training space. So that is our sort of group and personal training areas. We have five full-time coaches. One of those is our general manager. And something that I’ve done to be able to offer that professional service long term is we only hire full-time coaches. OK? So, we’ve never had part-time staff. And I kind of mentioned that earlier. We’ve kind of slowed growth down a little bit till we find that next full-time person because just from a consistency point of view, from a continuity point of view, making sure everyone understands our SOPs, everything like that, the full-timer, in my opinion, helps to deliver that higher level of service. Right? I also have a CSM, client success manager, who works remotely, and she really—probably one of the biggest things when we brought her on was one of the biggest sort of boosts in the business because she deals with every email of mine prior to me logging onto my emails.

Mike Warkentin (13:19):
Did she get mine from me yesterday?

Darren Thornton (13:22):
Yeah. Yeah. Well, she would have. Yeah. So yeah, my routine is I try not to log onto email until about 10 o’clock in the morning. It doesn’t always happen because the brain sometimes is going ahead of me, but if I can, she can put out all of those things that I don’t need to touch before I get there, which just means that my brain’s not full of all the different fires and whatever. And then if there’s anything that’s out of the ordinary, maybe we don’t have an SOP for it or whatever it is, that can then get pushed up to me, and this is something that was like a Dan Martell principle that I adopted pretty early when he spoke to us, I think, at one of the Summits potentially. So, and obviously from his book and everything, but that one has been really key.

Darren Thornton (14:02):
And then, yeah, so that’s the business. Five full-time coaches. One is our general manager. We have a client success manager as well who is remote. And then, our main sort of avatar is—we’re in a really good family neighborhood, so our avatar is really the family, right? It’s not a particular one person. It tends to work that we initially get the wife, the husband then joins, and then the kids in the kids’ program, right? So, we end up with pretty good 360 coverage of the local families, which was one of the reasons we actually put ourselves here.

Mike Warkentin (14:38):
That cuts down on marketing costs big time because you don’t have to look for clients if you just say, “Hey, would your spouse come in? Would your kid come in?” Right? Like, that’s just an easy way. So again, point three listeners, ask your clients, your current clients, if the people in their family could use your help too. And I guarantee you’ll find some clients out of that, and your marketing costs will go down. CSM—this is another huge point—client success manager takes care of retention and does all sorts of stuff to run the business better and keep clients longer. If you keep clients longer, your revenue goes up, and you make more as a gym owner. Client success managers are important roles, but they don’t need to be paid $100 an hour. You can find them for very reasonable prices, and you can give them a list of tasks to do.

Mike Warkentin (15:19):
Dan Martell at the Summit said something like this: I believe it was, “80% done by someone else is 100% effing awesome.” Of course he used the actual f-word there, but I’ll leave it out here for the podcast. Delegate some stuff. Create an SOP, give it away. You don’t have to answer every email. Some of them are just lame. And if it’s just like getting back to me and saying, “Yes, I can be on your podcast,” your CSM can do that by looking at your calendar. Darren doesn’t even have to check his email to get on the show. He just has to let his CSM do it, and then he has to show up on time. It works just like that. These are incredible principles. So, you’ve got a bunch to work on already. I want to ask you this one, Darren, I think I know the answer, but I’m going to ask anyway. How has your net owner benefit changed over time? Are we talking steady growth? Are we talking huge gains? How did it work?

Darren Thornton (15:58):
I kind of just had a number that I needed to make from the gym, being sort of relatively modest and then, all of a sudden, the business is generating a lot more revenue than we—basically I ever expected. So, over time there’s been some bigger jumps certainly. It’s not been quite linear; it’s been more like, “OK, this is what I needed.” And then, we’ve had a really big boost in business, whether we’ve hired a couple of coaches who’ve managed to take the business to the next level. And then that allowed me to go up to quite a significant salary jump.

Mike Warkentin (16:34):
Yeah. And there’s another gym owner on our leaderboard who—he answered some questions for a survey, and he said that his number’s very high, but he said that it could be higher. He chose to hire someone to buy back more of his time. And he said that kept his number where it was, rather than boosted it up. But he said the investment was a great thing for him. He wanted that time more than he needed the money. And so, he did that, and it worked out just fine for him. He was still on the leaderboard making a really, really great wage, but he made that call. And that’s the freedom that you have when your business is paying you a lot. You could choose, “Maybe I work four hours a month, and I hire someone to do everything else.” Maybe—you know, you have all this freedom. So, tell us, if you don’t mind, share anything you’re comfortable with. How do you pay yourself? Is it salary, dividends? What do you do? How does your structure work?

Darren Thornton (17:18):
Yeah, I think you mentioned salary, dividends, sort of benefits from the business. We do a mix of all three. And you know, I think one of the best things about being a business owner is getting benefits from the business that you can do legally, right? Obviously speak to your accountant. I’m definitely not qualified in that area, but if you can live through your business a little bit—you know, things that you are doing for the business that will benefit you and costs that you may have if you were just an employee of a company—then obviously use that, and that can help sort of boost your net owner benefit as well. But yeah, a little bit of all three is kind of what we do. We have standard salaries and then from there, we can take dividend injections and use it to invest or improve lifestyle.

Mike Warkentin (18:06):
Yeah. And so, wherever you’re listening, check your tax code, check with your accountant, figure out what’s legal, and then use every bit of that that you can. And it’s simple stuff. It could be just like maybe you pay yourself for business use of say maybe a home office that you use for nutrition coaching or maybe part of your cell phone bill gets paid by the company. Stuff like this. You buy a package of pens; you’re using them for the business—the business should pay for that, not you personally. Find out what the tax code allows. Stick to it of course, and then do it because you deserve the benefit of owning a business, and you put in the hard work; you should get the reward for that. So do check with an accountant if you have any questions because mistakes can be made here. Now you talked about—you said something interesting where you said you had goal numbers and you tried to hit them. I want to know how a mentor helps you do that. Chris has said many times—Chris Cooper, our founder—“You need a goal, you need a plan, and you need someone to hold you to the plan.” How did a mentor help you hit numbers that you wanted to hit?

Darren Thornton (19:01):
I really liked the concept within the mentorship program, which I’ve just been through myself, is the idea of the next best thing, right? What is the next best thing that we can do to grow the business? And the further you get along in business, the more shiny objects appear, right? You have more time to research these, you maybe have more capital to invest in these kinds of things. But at the end of the day, what is going to provide the next sort of best return as opposed to just following all these different directions? So, somebody who keeps you accountable to that plan, right? So, having an annual plan and working back from that, what you need to do each month, what you need to do each week, and really sticking on target and looking at “What does the long term look like?” So, the idea of a vivid vision sort of three years down the line. Once you’ve got those things on paper, unless there’s some dramatic change in circumstances, like, “How can we stick to that as much as possible?”

Mike Warkentin (20:05):
Was there anything just earth shattering that your mentor—and you’ve been here for six years, so I imagine you’ve had a few—was there anything earth shattering that a mentor gave you that just was a light bulb moment where you’re like, “Darren, dude, I’ve got to do this.”

Darren Thornton (20:18):
It’s been a steady process over a lot of time. Like, I wouldn’t say there’s—you know, I think that’s one thing why I’ve been in the program for so long is there are always evolving tactics. There’s always evolving knowledge. The business is evolving. So, my role a year ago is not the same as what it was now; two years prior to that, it was different again. So, what you need to learn and what you need to—the questions that you’re asking are changing. So, it’s been a steady period. I think, for me, the biggest—I wouldn’t say light bulb moment for me personally—but the biggest thing to our business was figuring out how to market, which, going through the Two-Brain marketing course very early on in the program was like we did two and a half times our revenue in one month.

Mike Warkentin (21:05):
Did you really? Wow.

Darren Thornton (21:06):
Because—yeah, we did—because even though we’re in a great location, and these weren’t massive numbers back then, don’t get me wrong, but we did two and a half times our revenue just from understanding how to put a Facebook ad out there, right? So, that was one of the things where if we’d have not done that, then maybe we wouldn’t have been here anymore, right? Because I did not have a marketing plan. I did not understand what to do back then. So yeah, that’s probably one of the biggest, like, “OK, this is where we need to go. We need to have these plans in place to bring in members,” right? We had a very rudimentary business plan, which was like, “What’s the minimum amount of members we can gain each month and show the bank that we can make money so that we can get a loan,” right? But in reality, there were a lot more hidden costs than I understood, so we needed to grow a lot quicker than that. And yeah, so that was one. But you know, in terms of having a mentor, the relationship with a mentor is evolving constantly. There are always new questions that we’re asking. There are always different roles that my role evolves into. So, there’s always different answers that are needed.

Mike Warkentin (22:09):
Yeah. And the reason I ask is because it’s tempting to look for these one-hit-wonder, big promises, “Oh, mightier sales by $20,000 in one month.” They’re almost always tied to something a little bit sketchy and a little bit shady and something maybe that just isn’t sustainable. And I would rather, as a business owner, see incremental, steady gains all the way up the chain than have one big jump and then be like, “I don’t know what to do now because I just gutted my business with paid in full discounts,” or something like that. So, I love the idea of steady incremental gains and the idea of “This is next, this is next, this is next,” and it’s a constant, constant building of momentum to the point even where Darren, you’re at what we call our Tinker level. For listeners, that’s our upper-level gym owners.

Mike Warkentin (22:46):
They now have freedom of time and money. They can figure out what else they want to do. It might be open another business, it might be start something completely different or a second gym. They could do whatever they want. So, what do they do? And we have mentors that help them get at that level too because the mistakes are more costly at this level. The rewards are greater, but the mistakes are also very costly. So, we have mentorship all the way through from the beginning, start of a gym, all the way through to elite level gym ownership. So, Darren, we’re going to shut this guy down. I want to ask you for advice for someone who’s out there. So, there’s a gym owner out there listening right now who isn’t earning as much as they want from a gym. What is step one to increasing their net owner benefit when they hit stop on this podcast?

Darren Thornton (23:24):
I think the first thing you’ve got to do is figure out how much you need to earn from your business. If that number comes to $70,000 a year, OK, perfect. What do I charge for my services, and how many members do I need to get my revenue to a number that’s going to allow me to take $70,000 a year, let’s say? And I think, for me, that’s step one because if you don’t know the numbers, then you’re going in blindly, right? You’re not aiming for anything. So, if you figure out, “OK, I can only get 100 members because I’m in a small town,” or whatever that is, how much do you need to charge for that to enable you? And then what value can you provide for that amount of money that you need to charge?

Darren Thornton (24:01):
So if it comes out you need to charge $400 a month, OK, that seems quite a large number for a standard CrossFit gym, but how can you provide maximum value to enable you to charge that? And then work backwards from there. That comes from an annual plan, which is a really good resource in the Two-Brain toolkit, which allows you to plug in those numbers. How much do you want to earn? What do you want to spend on education? All those kinds of things. And then it gives you your monthly sort of revenue targets. And then you can work backwards and plug in: Are you going to do retail order? Are you going to do everything? But for me, step one is just figure out what you need to earn.

Mike Warkentin (24:38):
Dig into your metrics. I never did that when I opened a gym. I just said, “I’m opening a gym. I’d like to get a bunch of members. I’d like to make some money.” That’s vague. And it turned out vague on my balance sheet. It didn’t go great. I got a mentor, we dug into exactly what was needed and how to get there, and things started to improve greatly. So, you’re going to need to work on some numbers. An invitation for you: If you want to start looking at these numbers and figuring out how you might improve them, book a call. There’s a link in the show notes. You can talk to someone who’s going to talk to you about your business and explain how a mentor can help you to get from where you are to what your goal is. And you might not even know what your goal is, but you can talk about it on that call. Darren, I want to thank you so much for being here today. This is—you know, I hope I get to talk to you in a year because every time I talk to you, I learn something new. So, thank you so much for your time.

Darren Thornton (25:21):
Yeah, thanks, Mike. Appreciate having me on.

Mike Warkentin (25:23):
We will definitely see Darren again. He is one of our leaders regularly on the leaderboards. We’ll probably see him again. This is “Run a Profitable Gym.” I’m your host Mike Warkentin. Again, we’ve given you a ton of super actionable stuff, simple things that you can do right now. I’d encourage you to click out of the show and do something right now to grow your business. But first hit “subscribe,” and check out this message from Chris Cooper.

Chris Cooper (25:43):
Hey, it’s Two-Brain founder Chris Cooper with a quick note. We created the Gym Owners United Facebook group to help you run a profitable gym. Thousands of gym owners, just like you have already joined. In the group, we share sound advice about the business of fitness every day. I answer questions, I run free webinars and I give away all kinds of great resources to help you grow your gym. I’d love to have you in that group. It’s Gym Owners United on Facebook, or go to gymownersunited.com to join. Do it today.

The post Simple Income-Boosting Tactics From a Top-Earning Gym Owner appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

System Rot: How to Prevent It in Your Gym

So you’ve written all your SOPs and put them into a staff playbook.

You feel pretty good about yourself: You successfully systemized your entire business, which is a huge step toward reclaiming your time as owner and scaling the gym.

And then you drive to the gym to find the front door locked and confused clients waiting outside.

The Opening Procedures document was clear: “If you enter from the back door, unlock the front door immediately so clients can enter.”

Don’t hold a lighter to your playbook. That isn’t the issue.

Here’s how to solve the real problem.

Evaluate and Mentor

It’s common for gym owners to create playbooks, deliver them to staff members and dust off their hands.

But what do most people do when they get an 85-page book of procedures? They skim or they ignore it. Some read cover to cover—maybe 10 percent. But everyone forgets something over time.

Once you systemize your business with SOPs and checklists, your job isn’t done. You’re through the most tedious aspects of the job, so congratulate yourself on that. But now you have to install the SOPs and ensure they stick.

You’ll need to use two approaches:

1. Low-Level Tasks

With low-level tasks, you’ll go over a checklist with a staff member and ask if there are any questions.

Example: Cleaning—tick the boxes in order. It’s not complicated. But it’s very common for owners to miss “obvious steps,” and you’ll discover errors and omissions when you go through the list with a staff member. (My cleaner mopped floors without soap because I left out “add one packet of soap to mop bucket.”)

You must evaluate performance early and then at regularly intervals down the line—quarterly is a good starting point. With low-level tasks, you can just use a scorecard.

2. Higher-Level Tasks

With higher-level tasks, checklists often don’t work because senior staff members have freedom and responsibility within a framework. You need to teach them to operate inside that framework and coach them to success.

Example: Sales—you might go over your SOPs, then do role-playing in common scenarios. You might record sales meetings and break them down with the salesperson. You might provide books and resources to help the person improve.

You’ll need to evaluate performance at regular intervals—quarterly is best practice—but your evaluation must go beyond “is it clean enough?” Upper-level tasks are often tied to key performance indicators—like set, show and close rates for salespeople and retention rates for client success managers.

The freedom-in-a-framework approach requires you to be a mentor, not just an evaluator, so you’ll need to be prepared to help the person perform better. You can’t just say “your close rate sucks” and expect anything to improve.

“To boost your close rate by 5 percent, I want you to watch this video, and then we’re going to practice objection handling together on Friday.”

A Culture of Evaluation and Excellence

Here’s a bad plan: Do staff evaluations only when you discover all sorts of shortcomings and you’re furious.

When you do that, staff members sense your anger and are on the defensive. It’s tough to move forward.

But if you create a “culture of excellence,” staff members know evaluation and feedback are part of the deal. They expect it at regular intervals, and the best will welcome it because you’re clearly invested in helping them succeed.

In one of our mentor’s gyms, staff members know they will get at least one thing to work on in every evaluation. So even the most experienced coaches aren’t surprised when the owner brings up something that could be improved. They’ll also get lots of positive feedback.

The key: Schedule evaluations well in advance and be prepared to help your staff members address any shortcomings.

If you do that, your carefully crafted staff playbook will support the growth of your business, free your time as owner and protect your focus so you can work on CEO-level tasks.

The post System Rot: How to Prevent It in Your Gym appeared first on Two-Brain Business.

No Brown M&M’s: Van Halen’s SOP Lessons for Gym Owners

David Lee Roth and Eddie Van Halen didn’t hate brown M&M’s.

They just really liked standard operating procedures.

You might have heard that the hard-partying band Van Halen included this line in the “Munchies” section of its rider during its heyday: “M&M’s (WARNING: ABSOLUTELY NO BROWN ONES).”

It was in all caps, and it was underlined.

This wasn’t just idiosyncratic behavior from the world’s biggest rock stars. The line was there because the band’s shows were massive, expensive productions with all sorts of technical and safety considerations. Nothing could be missed.

Here’s what Roth wrote about the line in his autobiography “Crazy From the Heat”:

“If I saw a brown M&M in that bowl … well, line-check the entire production. Guaranteed you’re going to arrive at a technical error. They didn’t read the contract. Sometimes it would threaten to just destroy the whole show. Something like, literally, life-threatening.”

So do you need an “M&M note” in the SOPs for your gym?

Probably not. But you do need detailed SOPs that an 8-year-old can understand. It’s not about belittling staff but about maximizing clarity.

If you don’t create clear SOPs, you’ll always have to do everything yourself—and your business will never scale.

Here’s how to get your business out of your head.

The SOP for SOPs

Put a pen and a blank piece of paper in your car.

Drive to the gym.

Before you get out of the car, record where you parked and why.

Walk to the entrance of the gym. If you use a back door, write that down.

Turn on the lights. Write that down.

Flip on the “open” sign. Write that down.

Turn on the stereo. Write that down. Select the correct station. Write down the one you chose.

Continue until your first class begins. You’ve just created your Opening Checklist.

Do the same thing for every other part of your business, from answering the phone to coaching a class to closing the gym for the night.

Too Detailed or Not Detailed Enough?

Does this process of systemization seem like overkill? Why write the checklist and SOPs as if your staff members are 8 years old?

Because you don’t want gaps. Gaps are bridged by guesses. And no one guesses right more than half the time.

You’re better to be too thorough than to leave any room for guesses. Guessing means mistakes, and mistakes mean correction—uncomfortable conversations with people on your team.

Do you really want to have to tell them they forgot to take the garbage out? Or would you rather tell them to take the garbage out in advance?

Furthermore, think about what happens if a staff member leaves. When SOPs are locked inside heads, transition periods are chaotic and stressful. Your new staff member will park in the wrong spot, enter through the wrong door and crank the wrong tunes—and that will be your fault.

If you have all SOPs clearly documented, you just hand a checklist to the new staff member, walk them through everything and make sure they understand. This saves time, ensures your standard of excellence is maintained and preserves the client experience.

And remember: The checklist is there as the backbone, but clever, experienced staff members don’t have to carry it around and literally tick boxes. Once they know the procedures and follow them, they are “programmed.”

That doesn’t mean you won’t have to check the programming and make adjustments from time to time. You can’t just write an SOP, deliver it and assume everything will be fine forever.

In the next post in this series, I’ll tell you what to do when you “find brown M&M’s in your dressing room.”

But for now, here’s your task: Write one detailed SOP today. If you have SOPs, audit and upgrade one. Then book a time to deliver the new or upgraded SOP to a staff member.

If you follow this plan for every aspect of your business, your gym will run better, your clients will be happier, your staff members will be more efficient, and you’ll have more time and energy to work on growing your business.

Avoid this plan and you’ll be ordering garbage bags under burned-out lights while a coach in flip-flops mumbles a disjointed whiteboard brief to eight seniors who can’t hear him above the death metal.

The post No Brown M&M’s: Van Halen’s SOP Lessons for Gym Owners appeared first on Two-Brain Business.